S1 E6 Mr Willis of Ohio
by JDPostEpisodeChallenge
Summary: Season 1 Episode 6 Mr. Willis of Ohio


I'm already in my pajamas when he knocks on the door. There's no doubt about who it could possibly be. Nobody else I've ever met knocks on a door that erratically.

I flip the locks and open the door to see him standing in the threshold, several boxes in his hand. He's trying, and failing, to keep everything balanced.

"Your buzzer is broken again," he announces without preamble as a small plastic bag from an electronics store begins to slip and he leans to the right in an effort to compensate. "I really hate that you live in this building."

I watch him for a moment as he continues the subtle juggle of his boxes, moving gradually closer to the floor as they shift once again.

I roll my eyes and take a few of the items, stepping out of the way as he enters, heading straight for the living room.

He meows loudly at the cats, who scurry directly under my roommate's bed and I close the door behind them.

"What is all of this stuff, anyway?" I ask. Two of the bags have brightly colored logos printed on them from a big box electronics store, but for the life of me I can't figure out what he needed at 9:40 on a Thursday.

"I bought you a DVD player," he states, sitting on the floor and ripping into the largest package like a kid on Christmas.

"You what?" To say I'm shocked doesn't really cover it.

"I bought you a DVD player," he repeats, this time looking up to me with a jumble of wires and manuals in his hands. "Because you didn't get your refund."

"Josh! They're expensive. You can't just buy me an $800 DVD player like it's no big deal!" I'm shocked.

"Can." He states with all of the confidence he's notorious for carrying through the halls of Congress. "And did."

He goes back to work pulling the styrofoam out and plugging a few things in and I slowly sit down next to him.

"This is the most generous thing anyone's ever given me," I tell him.

That stops his progress immediately.

"You can't be serious."

"Umm..." I blush a bit. "I am. This is incredibly sweet of you, Josh. Especially when you don't even have a DVD player at your place."

He shrugs. "We don't really need two of them. We'll just watch movies over here."

"Okay." I smile softly. I have no complaints about that plan. If anyone else from the West Wing heard this conversation, they'd probably point out the obvious abnormalities in our boss/ assistant relationship. But they're not here for a reason, and this nebulous area is familiar to Josh and I. It's all we've got so neither of us tend to question our actions.

Only a few minutes later the player is installed.

"Where's the bag of movies?" He asks.

"You bought movies too?" I ask.

"Well, yeah. What else are we going to watch? Seriously, Donna, sometimes I wonder if you're paying attention."

He rifles through the discarded packaging before announcing that he found it and handing me the plastic bag. I pull out 2 slim boxes containing Sleepless in Seattle and Die Hard.

"Let's start with a modern classic," I give him a grin and hand over the box for the Meg Ryan film that I made him endure so many times during the campaign. He pretends to grumble but we both know he loves that movie.

I gather the trash from the assembly and clear it from the living room floor and pop into the kitchen for a beer to split with him.

He gets the movie ready to go and flips off the lights before crashing onto my couch and toeing off his shoes, putting his feet up on my coffee table. He rests his arm across the back of the sofa cushions and I sit next to him, as close as I dare.

We orbit each other in a very particular way, and though the lines of physical proximity are frequently blurred between he and I, we do our best to stick to what we know works for us.

By the end of the movie, Josh is fast asleep, snoring with his mouth wide open and his head tilted back on the couch. I wake up after dozing on and off and blink a few times, surveying the living room, which is illuminated by the blue screen from my tv. I ever so slightly readjust the throw blanket that's over us Josh as pulls me close before he goes back to snoring and I bury my face into his side.

With any luck, there will be many movie nights in our future.


End file.
